The invention relates to bird feeding and more particularly to inhibiting rodents from accessing bird feeders.
Many people provide bird feed for birds to come and eat near the people""s homes. People often enjoy watching the birds or otherwise enjoy providing food for birds. Often, however, rodents such as squirrels will eat the food intended for the birds. This is typically undesirable, e.g., because the people supplying the food want to attract birds, not rodents, and because the rodents can consume large amounts of the food, causing people to spend more money than desired on bird feed. The rodents can also spill the bird feed, and even harm or destroy the feeder itself.
Many devices exist that are intended to deter, inhibit, or prevent rodents such as squirrels from reaching, eating, or wasting bird feed or reaching or harming bird feeders. These devices can require large amounts of maintenance. Often these devices are designed for a particular feeder, or to feeders mounted in a specific way. Some devices include motors that will spin a rodent that reaches the feeder. These motors typically require batteries that have a limited useful life, requiring recharging or replacement.
In general, in an aspect, the invention provides a bird feeder configured to hold bird feed and to provide access to the bird feed by birds, the bird feeder including a housing, and a perch coupled to the housing and configured to have at least a landing portion of the perch move from a feeding position toward a feed-inhibiting position, different from the feeding position, relative to the housing, the perch being configured to have the landing portion provide support for a bird eating the bird feed while the perch is in the feeding position, the perch being further configured to be in the feeding position in the absence of an animal""s weight being applied to the landing portion of the perch, and to have at least the landing portion move toward the feed-inhibiting position in response to application to the landing portion of at least a weight associated with an adult squirrel, wherein the perch is configured such that landing portion of the perch will inhibit a squirrel from using the landing portion for support while in the feed-inhibiting position.
Implementations of the invention may include one or more of the following features. The landing portion is substantially perpendicular to gravity in the feeding position and is substantially parallel with gravity in the feed-inhibiting position. The landing portion is less than about 45xc2x0 relative to parallel to gravity in the feed-inhibiting position. The perch is configured to return to the feeding position upon removal of the at least a weight associated with an adult squirrel. The perch is configured such that the feed-inhibiting position of the landing portion of the perch will influence a squirrel to fall off of the feeder. The landing portion is biased toward the feeding position. The feeder further includes a spring coupled to the landing portion of the perch and wherein the landing portion is biased toward the feeding position by the spring. The perch is coupled to the housing such that the landing portion can pivot between the feeding position and the feed-inhibiting position. The perch is coupled to the housing such that the landing portion can slide between the feeding position and the feed-inhibiting position.
Implementations of the invention may also include one or more of the following features. The housing provides an opening configured to allow a bird to access the bird feed held by the feeder and wherein the perch is further configured to inhibit access through the opening when in the feed-inhibiting position. The perch comprises a door, coupled to the landing portion, that is configured to at least partially block the opening when the landing portion is in the feed-inhibiting position. The perch is a first perch and the landing portion is a first landing portion, the feeding position is a first feeding position, and the feed-inhibiting position is a first feed-inhibiting position, the feeder further comprising at least a second perch coupled to the housing and configured to have at least a second landing portion move between a second feeding position and a second feed-inhibiting position relative to the housing. The second perch is configured such that the second landing portion can move between the second feeding position and the second feed-inhibiting position independently of the first landing portion moving between the first feeding position and the first feed-inhibiting position.
Implementations of the invention may also include one or more of the following features. The perch comprises a mounting member adapted to fixedly couple to the housing, a spring, and a landing member having the landing portion and being pivotally coupled to the mounting member, the spring being disposed to bias the landing member away from the mounting member toward the feeding position. The mounting member is configured with teeth and is configured to be wedged into a receptacle provided by the housing. The feeder further includes a sound-producing device coupled to at least one of the housing and the perch and configured to be actuated in response to the landing portion moving toward the feed-inhibiting position. The feeder further includes a top, and wherein the perch is slidably coupled to the housing and is fixedly coupled to a top, the top providing an opening through which birds can access the bird feed, the top being configured such that the opening substantially closes to inhibit access to the bird feed when the perch moves to the feed-inhibiting position. The top defines a plurality of openings, wherein the perch comprises a platform coupled to a corresponding plurality of landing members and the housing defines a corresponding plurality of slots configured to receive the landing members as the landing members move from respective feeding positions toward respective feed-inhibiting positions, and wherein the housing and the top move relative to each other to substantially close the openings when the landing members move from respective feeding positions toward respective feed-inhibiting positions.
In general, in another aspect, the invention provides a bird feeder for providing access to bird feed by birds and inhibiting access to the bird feed by squirrels, the bird feeder including a housing including a base portion and a top portion, the housing being configured to contain bird seed and provide access by birds to the bird seed, and perch means, coupled to the housing, for providing support to a bird to access the bird seed and for moving at least a support portion between a feeding position and a feed-inhibiting position in response to application of at least about the weight of an adult squirrel to the support portion to at least one of inhibit a squirrel from using the support portion for support to access the bird feed while in the feed-inhibiting position and inhibit access through the housing to the bird feed.
Implementations of the invention may include one or more of the following features. The support portion moves from being substantially perpendicular to gravity, with the feeder in use, while in the feeding position toward being parallel to gravity when moving toward the feed-inhibiting position. The support portion of the perch means is spring-biased toward the feeding position. The perch means comprises a retractable cord coupled to the support portion. The perch means comprises a sensor and an electrical release configured to allow the support portion to move in response to the sensor indicating application of the at least about the weight of an adult squirrel to the support portion.
In general, in another aspect, the invention provides a movable perch replacement for use with a bird feeder including a base, the replacement including a mounting member configured to be mounted to the base of the bird feeder, a spring, and a landing member pivotally coupled to the mounting member and biased by the spring away from the mounting member, wherein the spring is configured to support the landing member, while a bird stands on the landing member, in a substantially horizontal position and to allow the landing member to pivot toward a substantially vertical position in response to a weight of at least about that of an adult squirrel being applied to the landing member.
Implementations of the invention may include one or more of the following features. The mounting member is sized and shaped to fit into a receptacle of the base. The mounting member includes at least one barb configured to resist removal from the receptacle.
Various aspects of the invention may provide one or more of the following advantages. Undesired animals may be deterred and/or inhibited from accessing bird feeders. An animal-deterring/inhibiting device can be self contained, employ a simple spring mechanism, and/or be self resetting. An animal-deterring/inhibiting device can adapt, or be adapted, to different bird feeders. A sound-producing device may be employed to deter animals. Access-inhibiting devices may be employed that inhibit access to bird feeders by animals exceeding a certain weight.